Rhubarb Rhubarb

March 3, 2009

Against the park’s winter wreckage, tiny citrus-scented white and pink flowers on the witchhazel are optimistic signs of spring where only four weeks ago children whooped and played in the extraordinary snow. I marvel at how the bulbs push up new centimetres of green. We have had a few good days feeling the sun’s weak rays. After months of nature’s inertia, suddenly everything seems possible and there’s a sense of urgency to get out and start planting. But late February and March can be a dangerous and deceiving time, taunting us with false starts.

Regardless, I have been wielding the fork and spade to prepare my vegetable patch. One irritating aspect is that the cat and dog think that it’s for their benefit, a new and soft litter tray. My deterrent against the pets, and the squirrels is some fine netting. I really felt like an old time gardener as I dug in bucketfuls of our home grown kitchen compost. It’s not all perfectly rotted, but eggshells help drainage and any alien bodies, like the knife I lost last summer, and mouldy oranges which shouldn’t have been put in the compost anyway, I put aside.
In a few weeks I’ll plant out my ‘chitted’ potatoes having left them in a cool light room. Warmth and dark will only encourage your seed potatoes to start towards the light, and you want the ‘eyes’ to be firm and holding the nutrients before they go into the ground. I’ve also got some garlic and shallots which are an experiment this year.

It’s gratifying to use last summer’s French bean seeds. I collected the dessicated pods dangling from the last trailings around the cane wigwams and stored them in plates on the old kitchen dresser. I plan to germinate them on the window sills in old eggshell trays filled with compost. I shall also see what comes of my own heirloom sunflower seeds which I collected five years ago from the farm where we lived in Andalucia. The important thing will be not let the seedlings get too leggy which is what they will do if exposed too long to the light and heat.

Do you know north Norfolk? If it’s not on your agenda, then add this eastern English rural backwater to experience space: wide open skies and flat fields spreading and fanning in the distance. As the light fades, the vast horizons here glow spectacularly in the last blasts of sunset and the huge sands by the sea at Holkham will revive most spirits.

North Norfolk remains a back of beyond place where old men in caps dig bean trenches in cottage gardens, and you can walk in solitude for ages with only blackbird song or the sudden flexing of a deer as it bounds through a hedge. I have often come back loaded up with herby lavenders, which do so well in this dryer part of the country or utilitarian country things like a traditional pestle and mortar or old folding card table from one of the unassuming secondhand shops in the small towns.

Last week I was there visiting friends, and on their advice, looking for a cheap bicycle. It is so much more scenic than looking for bikes, probably nicked, in a Brixton back alley. We drove past fields where white barn owls skimmed the hedge tops, and mounds of knobbly sugar beets were piled in thick sucking mud.

At Pode’s, a cluster of wooden sheds stuffed with old bikes and unrelated parts, a woman came out of a caravan on bricks and pointed us towards the possibilities. And there it was, a burgundy Raleigh Cameo (checking the online Raleigh Fans Forum I discover it is an eighties’ model) in good shape with two new wheels. After a quick wobble around I put my money on the counter including ¬¨¬£1.49 for a bell. Back home at the local accessories shop what savings I’d made on the bike were soon swallowed up in lights, lock, helmet and so on. But I’m happy enough with the deal.

WORTH A VIST

Out and about, in between meetings, and gasping for a caffeine hit, I came across Tea’s me around the corner from Ladbroke Grove tube. This teapot-sized boudoir-style cafe with big print wallpaper, tinkly chandelier and one informal table to sit around is a joy. There are elegant white cakes stands of gingerbread men, wobbly scones and flapjacks. The espresso here is exactly strong enough.

This is the season for rhubarb and so here’s my recipe for a crumble. I add orange and lemon for some interesting flavour.

Crumble:
300g plain flour,
175g unrefined brown sugar
200g unsalted butter, cubed at room temperature
Filling:
500g rhubarb cut into small chunks
150g brown sugar
juice and rind of l small orange
juice and rind of 1 lemon

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4.
2. Mix the flour and sugar in a large bowl then rub in the butter, a few cubes at a time, until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs
2. Place the rhubarb, sugar, orange and lemon juice and zest in a 24cm ovenproof dish
3. Spoon over the crumble mix
4. Bake in the oven for 40-45 minutes until the crumble is browned and the fruit mixture bubbling
5. Serve with cream, icecream, fromage frais and maybe, if its the weekend or you want to be more decadent a glass of sweet moscatel wine